To provide greater access to the Internet, the communication protocols and languages utilized by the clients and servers have become standardized. These protocols include the Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP), which is the communication protocol used for communications between clients and servers, and the Transfer Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). The TCP portion is the transport-specific protocol for communication between computers or applications. IP is a lower-level protocol than TCP and facilitates the transmission of data packets between remotely-located machines. TCP is a transport-level protocol that operates on top of IP. TCP provides a full-duplex byte stream between applications, whether they reside on the same machine or on remotely-located machines. TCP ensures that transmitted data packets are received in the same order in which they were transmitted.
Remote terminals or computers may connect to the Internet via an Internet Service Provider (ISP) using a variety of connection methods and speeds. These may include, among other things, a dial-up modem at 28.8 kilobits per second (Kbps), dial-up at 56 Kpbs, an Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) line, a Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), a cable modem, or a T1 line. Although each of these methods allow for connection to the Internet, each method does so at differing speeds. For example, a typical dial-up modem connects to the Internet at 56 Kbps while a T1 line may connect at 1.544 million bits per seconds (Mbps). The increased bandwidth of the higher speed connections allows more information to be downloaded in a shorter period of time.
Web designers are taking advantage of the proliferation of high bandwidth connections to the Internet by creating more content rich websites. This allows more information, multimedia, and features to be provided to the users. However, for users that are connecting to the Internet using a slower speed connection, these high-content websites take an exceedingly long period of time to load. Many users allow a limited period of time for a website to download. If a website is not fully downloaded within this limited time period, the user typically logs off the Internet or proceeds to another website. Thus, web-designers are forced to decide between providing content rich sites for the high-bandwidth connections and losing the low-bandwidth connections or decreasing the amount of information provided to everyone.